Title:
On the Possibility of an Electronic-structure Modulation Transistor

Abstract: We present a novel electronic-structure modulation transistor (EMT), which
can possibly be used for post-CMOS logic applications. The device principle is
based on the bandwidth modulation of a midgap or near-midgap localized state in
the channel by a gate voltage. A single-band tight-binding method coupled with
non-equilibrium Green's function formalism for quantum transport is employed to
predict the IV characteristics. Our objective is to confirm if an EMT has a
self gain and if it can overcome the 2.3kT/decade thermal limit with low supply
voltage. The ON current depends on the bandwidth of the state and is limited by
the quantum of conductance for a single band. The OFF current is set by the
gate leakage and tunneling through the higher bands, which is expected to be
small if these bands are a few eV above the energy level of the localized
state.